What am I thinking? What are you thinking?

Art mirrors Life - Work mirrors Dilbert

I walked into the Los Aneles office of ETC this morning to a perfectly unexplainable moment. It was an art installation, it was Dilbert, it was life.

If you have not heard yet - you will soon - there is a changing of the guard in the sales department out west. I was the regional Sales manager in LA for 8 years - taking over from Mike Griffith in 1995. Tim Guion took over from me in 2003. Tomorrow, Randy Pybas takes over from Tim to lead the western slaes territory onward.

Tim isn't going far - just downstairs in fact - to join the newly formed MPA lighting as part of the rep team in LA. Yes - simultaneous to all of this Tom Pincu and Bill Moodie - our longtime and incredibly successful reps in Los Angeles are retiring. Lots of change in the west - next it's an earthquake!

Well - the joke around here has been that the guys downstairs are just going to saw a hole in the floor and drop Tim through when the time is right! So this is what we found this morning at his desk.

Yes - its true. The sawing has begun!

Not only was this funny! It was very well done. Alan Falkner - one of of the fine field service techs in LA created this work of art complete with a CD player hidden in the room that plays a sawing sound on a ten minute loop! Alan - there are guys out there charging hundreds of thousands of dollars for this kind thing. You should consider a change of work.

In all seriousness - I wish Randy the best of luck in his new role and I'm happy to have him at ETC. It will be refreshing to spend some time getting to know him. And to Tim - I know you will be great downstairs as part of our excellent rep team. When I asked Tim when he was moving downstairs he pointed to the saw blade and said "as soon as this is done."

David

Lunch at Headquarters

One of the very best things about working at ETC is the casual atmosphere here in Middleton. While some people, from admittedly much MORE casual companies, accuse us of being "stuffed shirts;" I know better. The environment that Fred created for us to work in is  top-notch. The best time of the day is Lunch. People gather in town square and the best noise heard is laughter. There is a lot of genuine fun and fellowship happening.

On a weekly basis you will see families lunching with employees, babies being admired and kids chasing the moving lights around on the floor. We also have a lot of visitors.

If you get a chance to visit Madison - be sure to stop by ETC. We'd love to have you. Better yet, come work for us!

David

Only one guess for my business travel quiz?

Ok. Here is a hint. This is the view from my hotel window looking the other direction.

Any better? Here is another one. And yes, I did walk into the middle of the street to take this shot. I took it on the way home from seeing one of my ver favorite musical performers, Monte Montgomery!

One of my relatives is buried here. In fact - he was my great, great, great, great, great grandfather. Here is his tombstone. Can you read it?

And here is me with some of the local celebrities.

Any more guesses?

More on business travel . . . Friday the 13th style

As I said the other day, I have begun to really enjoy business travel. Even on Friday the 13th.

Arriving at the airport 2.5 hours early does pay off occasionally. I was informed at the auto check in kiosk that my 6pm flight was delayed until 9:50pm! Yikes. Fortunately Northwest was able to get me on a flight to Memphis leaving at 4:10. I praised the agent. (They don't get a whole lot of that ya know)

In flight to Memphis we were advise to take our seats for severe turbulence. I watched as we flew around a BIG storm. You know the feeling. It's that "I am not going home today" feeling.

Of course the Memphis airport closed and I get to visit a new city!  Tupelo Mississippi! Wow. Folks are real friendly there. In fact the town is known for Hospitality.

These are the nice ladies that run the airport. Heck, they may own the airport for all I know. The were very nice to us unexpected guests.

This is the baggage claim area.

I was impressed by the airport security. This appeared to work well (no terrorist activity observed) and it's probably cost effective. The department of homeland security should research this.

These friendly folks ordered us up a new plane to get us onward to Memphis.

Best of all - I got to stay in a Holiday Inn Express. I have the greatest feeling I will wake up very smart in the morning!

David

Business Travel

Once upon a time business travel was my weekly grind. I dreaded it. Then something changed. Probably the fact that I only need to do it about 9 times per year instead of per month!

I really enjoy a good trip now. Here is a photo of my trip for this week. Anyone recognize this city?

This is the view from my hotel window.  I really love this place and I have worked on business deals here before. They don't always work out.

Anyway - Guess where I am? Post your answer.

David

Trade Shows

There has been a lot of talk about trade shows this week with a couple of major companies changing their exhibition plans for LDI.

http://www.plsn.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1710&Itemid=1

What are your thoughts on this? I'll tell you mine.

I think most trade shows should be every other year. Period. There are too many shows and too much money is being spent on exhibiting. I really believe this. The trade show folks will parade out reams of data showing that everyone who is anyone who is even considering buying a product is at a  trade show. I think it is true that most trade show attendees would say that. Some of them are even being truthful!

I have no data, no stat's. But I have a strong gut instinct that the shows in the lighting biz are out-of-whack with the reality of the dollars earned. It is really difficult to calculate ROI on the trade show scene. We cannot really say how many of the prospects that visit our booth make purchases because of their visit. It is a good place to introduce product - but we have proven we can launch product without a trade show.

The web has changed everything as it relates to marketing. Customers can find out much more about products without visiting a show. Most of them will get demo's after a show anyway. The best part about a trade show is meeting customers who are planning projects you don't yet know about. On the other hand - we have reps. We pay reps to find out about these jobs and know what is going on in their territories.

Both Martin and High End are "refocussing their efforts on smaller more personal events." I applaud their efforts to do this! I also agree with Martins comments about their "name and customer base being well established." This is a good reason to focus on a different medium to reach customers.

Back to the beginning -- LDI, Lightfair, PLASA -- you should be every other year.

What's your idea?